


Mirrors Shattered

by TimeLadyoftheSith



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Angst/Comfort, Bedsharing, F/M, Hugging, No Smut, One Shot, Promises, Rage, Self harm/Comfort, Tending to Wounds, anguish, no kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-20
Updated: 2019-04-20
Packaged: 2020-01-22 22:43:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18536959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TimeLadyoftheSith/pseuds/TimeLadyoftheSith
Summary: She could see where he had clawed at his cheeks, leaving rivulets of vermillion along his sideburns. “I counted... I counted... I couldn’t help myself. Couldn’t stop it.” He pounded his fists into his thighs, before grabbing a shard of glass, staring into his reflection, and hurling it away with a howl.





	Mirrors Shattered

After two and a half years living in the TARDIS, Rose had long since begun to ignore the random noises that occasionally filled the halls. Sometimes they were thuds, other times they were the odd squawk of a bird that had escaped one of the expansive rainforest rooms (which kept cropping up despite numerous lectures from herself and the Doctor), and once there had even been the roar of an android lion that the Doctor has mistakenly powered up. As long as the low hum of the TARDIS permeated her dreams, the noises never woke her. Yes, the occasional nightmare had her scurrying to the console room, the Doctor’s favorite workshop, or the library, where she’d curl up in a chair and drift back off knowing the Doctor was there, but the noises never did.   
  
So, when she found herself shooting up, every fibre of her being vibrating in panic, her dream of swimming in a chocolate lake while the Doctor threw Marshmallows at her ripped away, Rose didn’t understand why. She panted in the darkness, her sweat chilling on her face and neck as she listened. The TARDIS’ hum had receded, leaving the air and her mind vibrating in the wake of its absences, like the heavy pressure when the power cuts out during a storm. Then she heard it, the sound of a strangled wail, and it was followed by the unmistakable crash and violent tinkle of glass being shattered. The sounds echoed into her room, forced under the the door by their intensity, and faded down  the hallway.   
  
Tossing her blankets aside, Rose scrambled off the bed. In a few moments, the door would burst open and the Doctor would stumble in to tell her everything was okay. The wail came again, louder, absolutely chilling in the feral danger. Another crash, and a roar of a wounded animal followed. “Doctor!” She raced to the door, ignoring her slippers and dressing robe as she went. It was locked, and that reality terrified her most of all. Rose’s door never locked unless she wanted it to. “Let me out! Let me out!” The wail filled the halls again, more glass shattered, this time below her feet, echoing up through the carpet from the stone room. “Open this door! Now!” She beat and kicked at the wood until it flew open.   
  
Dashing into the hall, Rose felt her panic rising dreadfully higher. Every door in the hall was ripped open, and as she ran past them, Rose found that the floors were littered with ruined mirrors. That gut freezing, spine wrenching wail reverberated around her again, impossible to pinpoint as it filled the corridors. “Doctor!” She ran, terrified of what she’d find, of what monster could have gotten into the TARDIS and wrecked so much damage. Everywhere she turned, chest burning, eyes drowning in panicked tears, Rose found mirrors shattered. Then she noticed the circles, not just any circles, but Gallifreyan writing in vibrant red marker in a trail that followed the devastation.   
  
“Where is he! Take me to him!” She pleaded with the ship. Rose had to find the Doctor, to make sure this creature hadn’t hurt him. She turned a corner, barely missing stepping on a tiny hand held mirror that had been demolished. A sheen of orangish tinted blood smeared the handle. Time Lord blood, the Doctor’s blood. “No! Doctor! Where are you?!” The wail was coming over and over again, and she realized it was words, but she didn’t understand the meanings. “Please! Please take me to him!” She begged the TARDIS, as her feet pounded down the stone halls that led to the deepest bowels of the ship’s infrastructure.   
  
That soul wrenching wail chilled Rose’s heart, louder than ever before, as she slipped in a thick splotch of the Doctor’s blood beside floor to ceiling mirror that covered the door to the archive room. It was a mangled mess now, with slivers as long as her arm dangling precariously from the frame. The sonic screwdriver lay abandoned ahead, and Rose scooped it up, her heart in her throat as she barreled down a flight of slippery stairs. His tie was hanging from a dead vine that was sprawling up the wall beside the Eye of Harmony room, and the wail pierced her mind again. “Doctor!” More blood, slicked by fingers along the dark, damp stones, leading to a rusted door knob. Another mirror broke inside, as the wounded, feral, sobbing roar vibrated the ancient wood. Rose threw it open. She stumbled in, finding herself in an art room, clutching the sonic like it was her whole protection, and glass crashed across the room. Rose froze, as her mind raced to make sense of the scene before her.   
  
The Doctor was pulling his bleeding fist out of the mirror, staggering back as he cried out in the most gut wrenching noise Rose had ever heard. He pulled at his hair with one bloody hand as his other landed a punch into his ribs. He staggered to the wall, a marker in hand from nowhere, as he drew something in circular Gallifreyan. Then he cried out again, flying towards a sculpture of silver glass that reflected his disheveled face. It was demolished before Rose could blink. “Doctor!”   
  
She ran towards him, as he yanked at his hair, pulling his cut and mangled hands away. “Doctor! Doctor! Stop! Just stop!” He stared down at her, and Rose sobbed at the utter emptiness in his eyes. No, not emptiness, guilt. It was The deepest, most terrifying guilt she’d ever seen.   
  
“Leave me, Rose. Leave... I don’t deserve... I... never realized.” He staggered away from her, wrenching his clothes as he wailed and beat at his chest. “Billions... there were billions.” He sprinted towards a window that housed a mesmerizing, swirling, dust orb, and slammed his fist into it. Again, that inhuman wail broke her soul, shattering it as he fell to his knees and beat his bloody fists against the stones. “Murderer, murderer.”   
  
It was the War, Rose knew without a doubt. She’d seen his fits before, the self loathing, the fury, even been witness to his nightmares on three occasions, but never had they ever been this bad. Never had he destroyed things, never had he physically harmed himself or wrote on the TARDIS. Never had he tried to send her away because of it. Dropping his tie and sonic, Rose crossed the room to fall to her knees and touch his hair. It was sticky with the blood from his hands. “I’m not leaving. Ever.” He sobbed at her words, shaking his head as he flinched away from her. “Show me your hands. C’mon. Lemme see how bad-“   
  
“I deserve to bleed. Leave me here. Go, just...”   
  
“You always talk to me after a nightmare, Doctor. Tell me what you saw.” Rose reached for his hands again, but he curled them away with another wail.   
  
“Didn’t see it Rose.” His voice was raw, and blood splattered down his chin as he coughed. Rose fell down to her rear, wiping her own tears as the Doctor raised his blood streaked face to her. She could see where he had clawed at his cheeks, leaving rivulets of orange and scarlet along his sideburns. “I counted... I counted... I couldn’t help myself. Couldn’t stop it.” He pounded his fists into his thighs, before grabbing a shard of glass, staring into his reflection, and hurling it away with a howl.   
  
“Counted what, Doctor?” Rose didn’t try to touch him again. She just sat there, palms open and waiting on her knees, as his bloody tear streaked eyes stared through her.   
  
“I couldn’t help it. I just started counting, and I couldn’t stop!” His words were so hollow that she felt like they could swallow the universe. “I’m a murderer! A murderer.” his voice cracked, and he ripped away, stumbling to his feet. “Don’t look at me! Just go! Run away from me Rose! I’m a monster!” She staggered after him, skirting shards of glass as he darted to the door. It snapped open, and he ran into the corridor.   
  
“Doctor stop! Talk to me!” Rose tried to grab his arm, tried to do anything to get him calm, but he wrenched open a door, and it snapped shut in her face before she could follow. When she opened it, she found herself back in her dark room. “No!” The TARDIS finally stirred in her mind, a whimpering tinkle of assurance that the Doctor would be fine. Obviously the old girl had seen this side of him before, but it was breaking Rose’s heart. “He’s hurt. He’s going to hurt himself more. The ship was silent, but Rose ran back into the hall.   
  
The Doctor’s cries and the sounds of his sudden hatred of anything reflective were distant now, coming from the farthest reaches of the ship. Rose tried to find him. She kept running, until her lungs and feet burned, and she fell into a door that finally opened. It was the infirmary. Four cabinets were lit up, and she knew they were for her. Wiping her face, gasping for air, Rose opened them. One held a suture kit, another stored anesthetic, another had bandages, and the last had trays for cleaning wounds of debris. What Rose truly found hopeful was that the ship had gotten rid of the mirror over the sink and turned all the shiny cabinet doors from metal and glass to wood. “Is he coming?” She whispered to the ship, as she scrubbed her hands and set up the tray beside the examination bed. Her answer was the door opening.   
  
The Doctor staggered in, now only in his bloody, ripped shirt and his stained trousers. His knuckles hands were drenched in blood, swollen, as they hung limply at his side. “No... no... you’re still here. I told you to leave. The TARDIS is right outside the estate-“   
  
“I’m never leaving. Never. Now come here.” Rose pointed at the table, watching as the door disappeared behind him to leave a flat wall when he turned. The TARDIS whispered in her mind, a gentle impression of words. “She said all the mirrors are gone. You broke them all.” He slumped, forehead against the coral wall, as he gave another broken sob. Then his legs buckled, and the Doctor sank to the floor. “‘Ll come to you then.”   
  
Cautiously, Rose carried her tray to his side, kneeling beside the broken man who was staring at his mangled hands as if they were the most offensive things he could fathom. Gently, giving him all the chance he needed to stop her, Rose took his right one in her fingers and held it over the bowl she’d emptied the cleaning supplies from. Then, as tenderly as she could, Rose poured the sterile water over his skin, watching as it trickled vermillion into the bowl. “Tha’ hurt?” She whispered, when he hissed and banged his head back into the wall.   
  
“Yes, but I deserve-“   
  
“I think this knuckle’s broken. I don’ know how to use the Xray machine.” Rose set the water aside to pick up the tweezers and carefully pick the shards of glass from his skin. “After this, I’ll run you a bath.” She somehow knew that asking him what he had counted would only spur him back into his fit. So, even though it killed her to not know, Rose kept her focus on his injuries. “Luckily Jack taught me how to do stitches when we were stuck on Kilistrine. You’re gonna need a dozen on each hand. ‘Ll use the dermal regenerator on your face.”   
  
The Doctor did not reply, he just kept beating his head back against the wall, tears pouring down his cheeks, causing the blood from the gashes he’d dug into them to drip onto his shirt. It was, she realized, the most devastating image she’d ever seen. The Doctor, the Oncoming Storm, the Last of the Time Lords was broken, utterly silent as she tended to his wounds. His hair was a blood caked mess, glittering with shards of glass and who knew what else. Still, she didn’t press him.   
  
His silence dragged on for what felt like hours, as she cleaned and sutured his right hand, and then his left, and when she reached up a bandage soaked in sterile water to his cheeks, he stopped banging his head. He was a still as a fawn hidden in the brush, not even breathing as she erased his tears to reveal the ragged gouges. They weren’t deep, and the dermal regenerator filled the air with a heavy hum as Rose pressed it to his skin. When the last cut knitted itself together, those haunted, almost black eyes opened as Rose felt the weight of a thousand planets crush her chest at the agony in their depths. “Two point four seven billon, Rose.” His voice was a whisper, and it wavered off his lips as if The Doctor was afraid that anyone but her would hear.   
  
“Two point four seven billion what?” She breathed back, setting the device aside and touching the newly pink skin softly.   
  
“Children. That’s how many children were on Gallifrey the day I blew it up.” As the words reached her ears, Rose understood. She understood why he’d been wailing, what he’d been scrawling on the walls, the reason he’d clawed his face in anguish. It broke her heart, but it didn’t make her afraid of him. She’d always known, in some part of her soul, that there’d been children. Whether it be one or two billion, Rose had somehow always known that the innocents were the ones that plagued his conscience. She’d just never imagined he’d count them. “I never want to look at myself again. How can you even touch me, knowing this. Why aren’t you running? I’m a monster.”   
  
“Because, you’re hurting over this. Doctor, you’re not a monster if you feel this much guilt. It’s the opposite.” His eyes closed again, and Rose held her breath, waiting for him to refute her, to yell at her to run, but he didn’t. “You’re the best person ‘ve ever met, ‘nd if you were a monster, you wouldn’ fight so hard to bring peace.”   
  
“I shouldn’t have put this on you. This is my pain to carry alone.”   
  
Rose leaned forward to kiss his hair, then, tenderly she pulled him to his feet. “Nobody deserves to be alone.” She didn’t expect the tight hug, but she took it. She let the Doctor crush her to him and press his face into her hair. When they finally broke apart, she led him silently to her room, where he disappeared into the bath and returned with skin so red it was obvious he had scrubbed it until it was almost raw.   
  
“Come here, Doctor.” She patted the pillow beside her, but he didn’t fall onto it. He met her gaze, looking for all the universe like he didn’t understand why she was there, why he was still alive, and then he curled up on his side with his wet hair in her lap without speaking. “I’m here, Doctor. I’m here.”   
  
“I can’t hear them scream when you hold me.” His words were muffled by her shirt, but they reached her ears with the rawest honesty, and Rose did the only thing she could think of. She wrapped her arms around the Doctor’s shoulders, and stroked his soaked hair as softly as possible. “I don’t want to hear them scream anymore.”   
  
“Then let me hold you, Doctor.” Rose pulled the blanket over his legs and cradled the weight of Gallifrey against her stomach. “I’ll hold you forever.” She swore, even as his arms snaked around her waist as his tears stained her shirt.   
  
“I don’t deserve it.”   
  
“That’s for me to decide. Now hush and sleep.” His arms tightened around her at the words, and Rose felt him surrender to her promise. “I’ll keep the nightmares away.”   
  
“Forever?”   
  
“Forever.”   
  
  



End file.
